We figure the new name will alert people that these are not your typical previews. But they are MY typical previews, so of course go after Mike Tice really hard, talk about organic produce, and name-drop Timothy Leery.

Posted by: Mike Tanier on 06 Sep 2013

13 comments, Last at
31 Oct 2013, 5:49am by
http://kingofhorror.com/

Comments

"This capsule may not have made as much football sense as some of the others, but if you now have an image in your mind of Jerry Jones wearing a hipster hat and holding a limp zucchini, my work is done."

Yes, I know Tice is an easy target, and some of the ridicule is warranted, but let it be noted that he did not put the garbage on the Bears roster, nor was he around when the garbage was replaced by usable merchandise. If the Bears o-line makes marked improvement this year, as is likely, no, coaching improvement will not be a major factor.

Strangely, Tice was a pretty good o-line coach when he had better players, and not just with HOF-level or near HOF level players like Randall McDaniel, Gary Zimmerman, or Matt Birk. When the first two guys were gone, Tice was mostly given a bunch of late round draft picks, and unheralded free agents, and they became a very productive unit.

I suspect it's more his handling of the garbage than its overall performance that draws such ire. Vince Lombardi couldn't make J'Marcus Webb into a good tackle, but it can't possibly have helped the offense to be shuffling the players around into different positions every week. Not only does that mean that a lot of guys who are severely talent-impaired can't even take the time to master the skills of one position, but that the playcallers can't even assume they know where the breakdowns are going to come from and scheme to counter that. And there's no chance of ever building any synergy, continuity, or whatever word for a team working together to upgrade on their individual talent levels in overall performance that you want to use when there's no continuity. Of course, injuries do play their part, but there's a point where shuffling the deck chairs on the Titanic makes it harder to get to the lifeboats.

Offensive alternative names for a rival? That's perfectly understandable. If I am a d-bag you can call me a d-bag (mildly offensive to language prudes, but d-bags deserves it, right?). But whether or not I am a d-bag, you can't call me (to use my own ethnic background) a Guinea/Dago/Wop because that's offensive to a wide swath of people... I think that's how it works. I don't give a rat's rump, but whatever. I don't often side with Peter King, but on this item I do.

And you know what, it's rarely the other team as a whole that's the problem deserving of expletive-laden nicknames. In my experience, it's usually individual players who always somehow kill your team (Darren Sproles, Colts fans worldwide are looking your direction, you twerpy $%#@!), or the fans who are truly worthy.

Why do I hate the Jets a dozen years after the breakup of the old AFC East? Partly because they beat the Colts in SB III, but more because I grew up in a town filled with noisy, pushy, mouth-breathing Jets-lovers. Ugh.

No way NE scores only 27 against the Bills. The defense alone might score 14 on mistakes by Buffalo. And BB will keep the pedal down trying to get his new WR's completely adjusted. I take the over 27 by a lot.